Yoga for Golfers: Core and More

The popularity of yoga has increased by leaps and bounds lately. In an era of the mindless rat race, everybody is finding solace in the calm and purpose of yoga. Including it in your exercise regime could do wonders for your core strength, stability and mental focus. In itself, yoga is not enough to satisfy your physical work needs for golf. You have to intersperse it with other exercises and diet changes. Yoga is a refreshing discipline that smoothens out the kinks in your mental processes and heals your body inside out. Besides, it relaxes you in a way that is priceless practice for the cutthroat environment on the golf course. If you are taking up golf on a professional basis, turn to yoga for its legacy of spiritual, mental and physical benefits.

Building Muscular Endurance

Many of the Yoga asanas are muscle endurance exercises. Yoga boosts this area in a methodical and gentle way. So you won’t be dreading your next bout of yoga, you’ll look forward to it. Muscle endurance is the term for the ability of muscle to endure repeated contractions against a resistance. It comes in play when you do iterations of weight lifting or static cycling. In yoga, you hold the muscles contracted in one position for an extended time frame. This rewards the muscle with more tolerance against restraining forces. Golfers require high muscle endurance to keep themselves sharp on the golf course for long hours. If you are a professional player, yoga will help you perform consistently for the 3-4 hours of every round. After completion, drink some honey lemon drink, it is a nutritional advice from my yoga experts. Here are recipes for Honey Lemon Drink and why it’s good for you.

Building Core Stability

Golf is a game of controlled movements. You do not channel all your aggression in one shot here. Even a long shot should be taken with great caution so that it does not overshoot its destination. This requires stability in selected parts of the body. When your upper body is in the rotation, your legs should hold steady for your swing to make the right impact. The golf club gains momentum as it moves and it can potentially disturb the balance of these stationary parts. Yoga can bring stability to your golf moves. Yoga asanas like Virabhadrasana and Setu Bandha Sarvangasana require you to stay in a particular pose for 30-45s. The more you balance yourself in these postures, the more your body starts to accept them by working the right muscles. It’s like practicing headstand. You do it long enough, you can eventually hold your balance.

Building Core Strength

If you have ever had to swing a metal club, you will know you need muscle strength for golf. Of course, you have. And you have had to deal with the consequences after the round. Although there are no external weights involved in yoga, you build your muscle strength substantially. Strong trunk muscles help in supporting your backbone and relieve stress in your lower back. Every time you do an AdhoMukha Svanasana or Chaturanga Dandasana, you are lifting your own body weight. That’s quite a bit of weight. The muscle tone and definition improve over time. You might even see muscle size gain with sustained yoga. But then you are not going beyond you 150-250 pound weight. So this becomes a limiting factor. Our advice is to merge yoga strength-building asanas with your weight training schedule.

Hip Flexibility

A tight hip is the bane of golf. Golf swing dynamics depend on measured movements of the upper body while lower body remains relatively stationary. This can put the immense amount of strain on the hips if you are tight in the area. The hip alone is not the issue. It hides deep joints which are covered by ligaments and muscle. A misstep in any of these layers can cause pain in the hip. Yoga is infamous as the ‘flexibility’ building exercise. It is right in a good way. You have some hip flexor exercises that can help your hip keep up with the test of golfing strain. Poses like Bharadvajasana, Gomukhasana and pigeon pose combine many benefits mentioned here. These help you improve your range of motion in the torso.

Reduce Imbalance of Strength

Since golfers put reiterated stress on certain parts of the body, there’s more strain on some muscles than the other. This creates an imbalance in muscle development and endurance. Some of the muscles remain stable and while others need to be mobile. The body needs to be precise in moving and restraining them. If this kinematic pattern goes wrong, the swing will falter or may even cause injury. Yoga gives your body a wholesome workout which includes working the small muscles as well as the major ones. A Suryanamaskar is a package deal of many health benefits and it leaves you rejuvenated in the morning. The regulated breathing patterns and physical exertion hone your body slowly but steadily.

Mental Peace and Focus

Yoga is an effective stress buster. It cleans the body and mind of negative energy. It has psychological and cognitive advantages. It improves your mental well-being through concentration and breathing exercises. As it dips the heart rate and blood pressure issues, your anxiety level takes a plunge. It boosts concentration on everyday mundane tasks. Even the enjoyable job of driving the golf ball might not invite much focus from you after a few shots. Yoga helps you concentrate and be at the moment in spite of all the mayhem around you. The Gomukhasana and pranayama can help wash out the dreary mood and attention deficit.

Disclaimer:All images are provided by the author.

About Author:

I am Dominic J.Leon. At my website ubergolf.net, we provide holistic literature towards the development of your golf career. We have all the information you need to bring your A-game to the golf course. We will arm you with comprehensive knowledge about all things golf, from the best golf GPS to all about indoor golf. We specialize in buying guides, reviews, how-to tips and golf nutrition tips. If you would like to learn and grow with us as a golfer, do follow us on our website.

Health Topics

Important Links

About Safe and Healthy Life

At safeandhealthylife.com our mission is simple: to make your life safe, healthy and effective with latest health info. A website run by Carla Smith with her team, We share a passion for helping others reach their goals of optimal health. Our blog includes a unique combination of innovative articles that are very helpful to improve your health. Email us anytime: safeandhealthylife@gmail.com